Morelia, Mexico

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Friday 9/2/07
I was just climbing out of my skin tonight. I haven't seen Sam in so long that it's beginning to make me a bit crazy at this point. What to do with myself and a long weekend while he's on the road with the band for another week or so? So, I got on the internet and started shopping around for something to do during the weekend. I found a cheap flight to a place called Morelia, Mexico. I booked a hotel next and that was that. I spent some time on the internet figuring out what I really needed to see and learn about Morelia, which is the capital of the state of Michoacan (I learned). A great website to use if you want to learn about a new place, is escapeartist.com. This is a website largely written by ex-pats who are living in these places so they really give you a great feel for the day to day life in a city.

Saturday 9/3/07. I woke up at 5:30 and threw a couple of changes of clothes in a tote bag, grabbed by passport and headed for the airport. I'll never understand why we need to be there two hours early for an international flight. My deepest suspicion is that it's a conspiracy with the airport vendors to trap you there until you feel forced to buy a five dollar diet coke (since you can't carry your own in past security). At any rate, I hurried just so I could wait two hours in the terminal. I ended up sitting next to a young woman who was from a small town just outside of Morelia who also lived in Morelia for three years while she went to the university there. She now works for a petro-chemical company in Houston and was going home to visit her family. I'm so glad I met her and you'll see why soon. Having been to Mexico numerous times, I know that prices are variable depending on who is asking so I asked her about what to expect for taxis, etc. The time in the terminal just flew by and finally we boarded. Two and half hours later we landed in Morelia.

I discovered that the hotel was about 15 miles away and that I would need a cab as it would take about an hour given the roads and traffic. Nelda, the woman I was speaking to in the terminal, had advised me that a cab to the town should only cost about 60 pesos ($6 or so). Of course the cab driver told me it would be 250 pesos. I decided to wait for her to get off the plane and see if she could help me barter a better rate as my Spanish isn't fast enough to pass for a local. She did one better than that. She and her family gave me a ride all the way into town, then took me to a taxi stand, negotiated the rate for me and told him to take me to my hotel. As we were leaving the airport we were stopped by local police who were posted in the median of the highway. They asked Nelda's brother- in-law a series of questions and then allowed us to get on our way. Nelda explained to me that this is one of many strange things that go on here. They stop you to ask where you are going and why but then also want to know which political party you are supporting. I'm not sure what happens if you give the wrong answer but it sure was an interesting thing to observe. I don't know what I would have done if I had been on my own in a rental car at that point. Nelda, wherever you are, thank you for your help.

Once you get away from the large resort towns, Mexico is so poor. Every American child with a case of the "I wants" should have to come here and see something of how people live and what they do without and don..t even know that they are doing without. Every family should have to make one trip across this border with their children and let them experience what it really means to go without rather than going through life thinking an IPod and a big screen TV are the necessities of life. My hotel was lovely, clean and decorated beautifully in shades of yellows and deep greens. They have one of the most interesting energy saving methods I have ever seen and wish all the hotels, houses and apartments offered this option. Once you get your room key and enter the room, there is another small slot for you to place your key inside, located right next to the light switch. No electricity works in the room until it's in there. Three minutes after you remove the key to leave the room, all the power goes off. Can you imagine how much energy this must save?

I read about the Mercado on the internet the night before I left so I knew that was one of the places I needed to visit. I had learned my lesson about the taxi earlier so when I hailed down a taxi this time I asked him, in my second grade Spanish, how much it would cost to get there and haggled with him. Once the price was settled, he had no incentive to drive me all over town and waste his own gas money. For a small 30 pesos, I was driven to the Mercado. I must mention that driving in Morelia is the same as driving in Puerto Rico. There are no lanes and everyone drives all over the road, stopping when they want to, running lights without any hint that they saw them. It's a frightening experience. After the cab ride I thought strolling through the Mercado would relax me with a little "window" shopping. I've never been anywhere as over-stimulating in my life. This was the largest market I have ever seen, taking up more than a few city blocks. It was so loud from all the people visiting with their families and bartering with the merchants, the younger merchants blasting radios to get your attention, the strong smell of fresh produce and, later, raw meats. The locals do all their shopping there and it..s just one row after another of everything from raw meat and seafood, to clothing and housewares, to fresh produce and food stands. Everywhere there are people jammed into tight huddles with their families and talking so fast and touching each other..s faces so tenderly. It was amazing but the smells overpowered me and off I went to find my way back outside. I had many miss-steps as people look at my skin color and assume I can speak the language even though I'm clearly not from Morelia itself. They know that because the women in Morelia have a distinctive look and fashion sense that I did not display, in my hiking pants and comfortable shoes. The women dress in very form fitting clothing without regard to size. They also, almost universally, pluck their eyebrows into pencil thin arches that are then blackened severely. Lipstick is drawn heavily with dark liner before being filled in by a much lighter shade on the rest of the lip. Mascara is a must and is applied heavily. The interesting thing to me while shopping for cosmetics is that although these women are my color, it is impossible to find foundation that matches our skin tone. The women in Morelia use foundation to make their skin appear lighter. I found this just as sad as I do in my own culture. Lastly, every woman under 70 that I saw was wearing fashionable shoes with high heels. I guess you get the picture that I stood out as not being from the city of Morelia wandering around the Mercado without make up, and dressed inappropriately for a city dweller.

The other common misunderstanding is caused by my Spanish. I don't speak much of it but I've been told that my accent and speed of speech is quite authentic. This lead me into numerous ridiculous situations where I would walk up and ask a question in Spanish resulting in a rapid-fire, slang filled response to which I could only stare in response and mumble that I don't understand or speak Spanish well. That resulted in great laughter at my expense. As an aside, the websites I read said two things that my experience did not find to be true. The first is that you can get by on English in the city. NOT TRUE. The second may be completely my misunderstanding but it said that the major industry is tourism. In my largely ethnocentric way, I took this to mean that there were a lot of foreigners there. Also not true. Most of the tourists were from other parts of Mexico. I'm sure during the week there may be more English speaking people as a number of American corporations have offices there.

After I looked around the Mercado for what seemed like hours, I decided to walk to the Centro Historico, where the town has preserved all of the original Spanish architecture. I walked a few miles and realized I had no idea which direction downtown was because I didn..t have a map. I hailed a cab and between his English and my Spanish, we were able to communicate enough to get me to the center of town that is built all around two magnificent cathedrals. I walked all over the 22 blocks that are designated as the "downtown" area. While the buildings are lovely, they have mostly been converted to stores, restaurants and other commercial enterprises. The cathedrals, however were breathtaking in their beauty. The stores were an interesting mix of very high end designers and a lot of discount stores full of clingy, shiny, polyester clothes for men, women and children. The one other thing was ubiquitous: Internet Cafes. They are very inexpensive and have high speed connections. They keyboards are a bit different, though and that made typing a challenge. Those who know me know that I type pretty fast so I had to take a few breaths and slow down to find the correct keys.

By this time, the day was waning and I'd been up waaaay too long. I took a taxi back to my hotel and then walked to the Plaza Morelia a couple of blocks away. I was disheartened to see McDonald's, Applebee's, Chili's and other American food chains all around me. The plaza was an open door mall with all the usual stores you might expect but the kiosks were more interesting. They were bakeries and fruit stands. I loved that. There was a very large movie theatre at one end and a large supermarket at the other. I went to the supermarket to buy bottled water and then stopped at a small restaurant for a lovely meal of enchiladas. Off to bed with me and my book.

Sunday 9/3
The hotel was really loud at night with people coming and going at all hours and the voices echoing off the satillo tiles in the hallways. I don't know how much I slept but I was up by 6. The dining room at the hotel was empty but they had a buffet. I couldn't help but think how much Sam would have hated the food, due to his dietary restrictions. The fruit was fresh but the beans and eggs were cold and covered in cheese. In fact almost everything was covered in cheese. Well, I didn't come here to eat so I had my little breakfast and headed back to the room until a more respectable hour. Nothing starts very early on Sundays as the community is church-going. Ah!, I thought. Church!

I headed out of the hotel on foot. It didn't take long to find a lovely church set several steps below the sidewalk. I decided to go in and enjoy mass here. What a lovely way to spend the early morning hours. I wanted to find a bus tour outside of the city but could not locate any that ran on a Sunday. I decided the best thing to do would be explore the city on foot. I hailed a taxi to take me back to the Centre Historico, where I did the obligatory walk around the blocks and then I started walking the 7 miles back to my hotel. This gave me the chance to see the city up close.

As I walked back, I noticed that the further away from the downtown area, the more you can see how the residents of this city live. Each neighborhood had its own appeal, although all of them had multi-colored houses that just look better here than when I see them in the US. They look like they belong here. There are beautiful homes that are walled in, the walls painted with shades of peach or yellow or covered in lovely murals. All of that beauty was ruined by gang graffiti in many places. In fact, much of the city, even the historical buildings are "marked". The more I walked, the more I became aware of much of this beautiful city was covered with it, much like many of our cities. It was disheartening. I walked through small neighborhoods of shops selling special things like desserts, breads, fruit, various forms of frozen treats, and then, of course, the Mexican food itself. The only restaurants with waiting lines were for other ethnic foods. There are Asian and Italian restaurants all over the place. I didn't see any Indian ones or I would have tried it just to see what it was like.

By the time I got back to the hotel, it was only mid-afternoon on my last day here. I took a shower and decided to head back out on foot in the other direction from downtown. By now I had gathered that a neighborhood was OK as long as I saw old women walking on the street with their shopping bags and purses. I walked to the Plaza Americanas and found it to be a rather dull Americanized shopping mall that was over-priced and under-stimulating. I don't know where I went after that, other than through several neighborhoods where I saw large families with several generations enjoying their Sunday afternoon together. I walked until I hit a neighborhood that didn't look like a place I should be-no old women with shopping bags and a few too many young guys lounging around and drinking beer. I hailed a taxi, did the negotiating dance and headed back to downtown where a concert was scheduled at the Plaza des Armas that evening. Since it was early, I had the chance to stop at an internet cafe and drop my husband an email, find some food at a cafe and then head out to the Plaza. The music was great, the people festive and I was taught to dance by a family who insisted I dance with each of them until I felt good enough to dance with others. Having walked a total of about 13 miles just that day, my arches weren't ready for more but you only live once, right?

I left on the 6:30 flight on Monday morning so that didn't leave time for anything but to wake up at 3 and make the ride to the airport. Good-bye Morelia. Thanks for a lovely weekend.

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